R,CHARD MONCKTON MILNES was born in the year - OUDL Home

56 Walter de la MareDangerous Ages, Told by an Idiot, Skin Deep, TheTramping Methodist, Poor Man, Studies in Wives,Seducers in Ecuador, The Maternity of Harriett Wicken,Why They Married, Tents of Israel, A Pitiful Wife,Secret Bread, Precious Bane, and, say, The Sheikh, anda difference in theme and aim, if not in quality, clearlydiscloses itself.Seriousness whether it be a condition of the spirit or anattitude of the mind is closely akin to sincerity, and insome kind or degree, though it may parch bad fiction likethe sirocco, it is essential to fine fiction, though a novelistmay smile and smile, and yet not be frivolous in virtueor in villainy. George Eliot was so serious as to be byconscious intention didactic, and to declare that hermission in life was that of ' an aesthetic teacher and aninterpreter of philosophical ideas'. Yet her fiction survivedthe strain. Seriousness indeed (however airilyvariegated), prevailed in the minor novels of the 'seventies.It may be in part explained by the fact that women hadbeen compelled to fight for the liberty of becomingnovelists at all.'Novel writing', said Mrs Parr, writing in 1897, andshe can scarcely have realised that a quarter of a centuryafterwards well over 300 women would be following herown dreadful trade,—' Novel writing has now become anemployment, a profession, distraction, I might almost saya curse.' 'The mania to see their names in print' hadseized upon her sex. But when in 1833, Anne Manningburst into her father's study with the announcement thatshe had finished a tale entitled, Village Belles, 'Papa',said she, 'I don't know what you will say, but I havewritten a story!' ' Ho, ho, ho!' was what Mr Manningsaid. He nevertheless read the tale, and afterwards remarked,'My dear, I like your story very much'. But ashe seems never to have referred to it again, the problem